Accused murderer talks about everything but his uncle's death

An RCMP officer exits 602 Cedar Cres. on June 3, 2014, after investigating the house where Ed Gyoba died. Nephew Shane Gyoba is charged with second degree murder

(JENNIFER STAHN /InfoTel Multimedia)

August 14, 2015 - 6:30 PM

LANGUAGE AND CONTENT ADVISORY

KAMLOOPS - Shane Gyoba was conversational on several topics during an RCMP interrogation interview on June 2, 2014, but Ed Gyoba’s death was not one of them.

Const. Mike Kube from the RCMP’s major crimes unit spoke to Shane in an attempt to get a second side to the story in the hours following his arrest at his uncle’s Cedar Crescent house in Ashcroft where the two lived. Ed’s body was found wrapped in garbage bags in a makeshift grave in the backyard of the property. The cause of death was several blows to his head.

Crown played a video of the interview in Kamloops Supreme Court today, Aug. 14 on the fifth day of the accused's trial. Throughout the interview, Shane appeared comfortable and spoke with Kube about tattoos, but when the conversation turned from a friendly chat to why he was there, the accused changed the topic. He spoke of multiple political views he held mainly centring around war and government, residential schools and internment camps.

“There’s nothing to talk about. (It) doesn’t matter what my side of the story is,” Shane said.

“We know that he’s dead. We know that you’re responsible. There’s no question about that. If I didn’t want to know the truth about what happened, we don’t need your side. We’re putting the evidence together. We’ve got eye witnesses that saw what happened. You don’t have to talk to me. If I didn’t care about your side of the story, I wouldn’t even be here right now,” Kube said.

Shane continued telling the officer his side of the story didn’t matter and told him his lawyer advised not to say anything about Ed’s death during the interview.

"Something got fucked up on this, I think. I think something happened today. Your uncle came over. Came to do some work around the house. And something went for shit. That’s what I think happened. Am I right or wrong?” Kube said.

“You’re a cop. When do cops think people in jail are innocent? When do you think you got the wrong guy?” Shane asked.

“I don’t give a shit about other cops,” Kube replied. “Can I ask you something? Do you remember when the police showed up and arrested you today? You said something to them. You said something very spontaneous. Remember what you said?”

"No, what’d I say?” Shane replied.

"Do you recall saying ‘if someone cut off his dick, it wasn’t me.' Do you remember saying that?” the officer asked adding three officers heard him.

Shane disagreed that all three officers would have heard the comment.

“That doesn’t make any sense. Why would I cut someone’s dick or balls off? How do I know if someone’s got his dick or his balls?” Shane said.

“This shit doesn’t get made up — even in movies,” Kube replied.

At that point, while watching the video of his police interview, Shane began to laugh from the prisoner's dock in court. In the day’s earlier proceedings, he made several demeaning comments to the sheriff keeping watch of him and became upset when Crown played the video in court.

Kube pursued Shane’s side of the story.

“The man’s dead,” he said.

“People die and people live. I’m not going to say anything about that. Anything I talk about is just going to bite me in the ass. You know that and I know that. It’s not that I’m callous,” Shane said. “I can cry or I can be mad or I can fake cry — it doesn’t matter. But if we talk about what happened with whatever, that’s got nothing beneficial for me or my life to talk about that. The lawyer said it’s nothing beneficial. It’s good legal advice. He said just not talk about it. That’s the way it goes. That’s the situation with you and me right now. If I say I’m innocent, it doesn’t help anything. If i say I’m guilty, it doesn’t help anything."

In the video, Shane began to speak of more conspiracy theories involving corruption in the police force.

OPINION Editor, This is a busy time of year, but I find it’s also a time of reflection, particularly as January marks the end of my two-year term as Chair and my 10 years serving on the Board of Interior